Despite the attacks, Deputy First Minister Jenny Gilruth promised to work with bus companies on the plans.
She told The Sunday Show: “Fundamentally, we’re trying to protect our people, and across the country just now we see a number of routes having been removed.”
Gilruth said the current private bus model was “a legacy of Thatcher’s time when she took away that opportunity for there to be direct intervention from the state” on bus routes.
“So we’re going back to an approach that better protects people,” she said.
“We only need to look at the approach that’s used, for example, in the city of Edinburgh to see how public ownership on this issue of McGill’s benefit the public in terms of the number of routes that are available.”
The Easdale brothers were “significant donors to the Labour Party”, she noted.
Gilruth said the Scottish government was already providing significant investment in buses, including free travel for under 22s and over 60s.
“Of course we work with bus operators like McGill’s and others to hear their views,” she added.
“We’ve always done that in terms of how we’ve rolled out our approach to the under 22s, and of course to the £2 bus cap.”
At the SNP conference, Swinney announced the extension of the £2 bus fare cap, with Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire to be covered from April.
The current cap covers Glasgow and West Scotland as well as the Highlands and Islands, with the government planning to expand it to the whole country by the end of the parliamentary term in 2031.